the winter classic, or why mike was up at 5 a.m. on new year's day

why was i up at 5 in the morning on new year's day? because it was time to head to chicago for the nhl winter classic, of course. duh. in an annual event dripping with tradition and nostalgia cultivated over its extensive history (the first was held last year, hahaha) [UPDATE: actually, there was a regular-season outdoor game in 2003 called the heritage classic, and it was held in edmonton between the oilers and the canadiens. however, this is the second official "winter classic"], the nhl stages an outdoor game on nyd, allowing thousands of local season-ticket holders, nhl bigwigs and their handpicked friends, and a few lowly average fans (like me!) to watch a game while simultaneously freezing to death. last year, the game was sabres-penguins and held at buffalo's ralph wilson stadium (where the bills play football), and this year's hawks-red wings game took place at wrigley field (which is home to no professional team of consequence). thanks to holli's fine online-ticket-purchasing skills, i was able to get my hands on a pair of late-release tickets. excelsior!

so anyway, after dragging my carcass up before a lot of people even went to bed, i hit the road and drove the empty highways and byways to my friend brian's house in the northwest burb of buffalo grove (all that's changed since i lived in that town, as brian pointed out, was that there was a new fence over there and that car-wash place next to dunkin donuts got a new coat of paint). here's what we look like. cute, huh? actually, we're not that big, as we both have 79 layers on:


brian's totally amazing awesome wife melissa (shout-out, you owe me five bucks) drove us to the purple-line stop in wilmette (motto: here we jog in the middle of the street, and damn the traffic). brian and i rode into the city to wrigley field. let the madness begin!


so after looking at some of the pregame sights, which included lots of people wearing hockey jerseys, angry cabbies laying on their horns, a news van from every possible tv and radio station (and network) imaginable, and a large area featuring kids activities, bad music, and really lame karaoke starring even more people wearing nhl jerseys, brian and i decided to find a bar.

yes, it was only 9:30 in the morning, but it was new year's day, the winter classic won't be held in chicago again for a long time (if ever), and it was happy hour somewhere...so why not have a few bass ales? to be honest, i can't remember the name of the bar, but it had friendly and prompt service and two empty bar stools.


around 11, we decided to head for the gates. here's a pic of wrigley from the corner of clark and waveland. unfortunately, this picture does little justice to the insane scene (and no, that honda is actually stopped and is not about to mow over all those people):


i doubt i could properly describe the incredible environment and palpable energy inside wrigley, so i'll just give you some pics. the second is our view of the ice (that pic is during the national anthem, and if you've never been a part of a national anthem during a hawks game, you've never been a part of a national anthem), and while there is a column in the way, it didn't distract a bit from the game. because we could lean.



at about this point (except for a few short warmed-up moments later, as you'll see), my camera crapped out, so i don't have in-game pics. thankfully, brian's camera had better batteries, and when he e-mails his pics to me, i'll post them too.

the fans around us were great, including the very hockey-knowledgeable couple to my left, the drunk psychos to brian's right, the very friendly man and his young son in front of us who had to endure the epically foul mouths of the two psychos, and the drunk guys behind us, one of whom insisted on slapping my hands and pounding my back every time the hawks scored, had a good hit, or apparently took a breath:


but the highlight was the 74-year-old woman (chaperoned by her daughter) sitting in front of brian. this rabid red wings' fan was very vocal and full of favorable (for the wings) statistics, and she was talking TRASH! her daughter told us that the cops had been called to her mom's house in the past because the neighbors thought the old lady and her husband were fighting, but it turned out that they were just yelling during red wing games. this classical bird got into it with the psychos (and us, to a certain extent), and i won't repeat some of the things that were said back and forth, as this is a family blog. believe me, she gave as good as she got. let this pic tell the story, when she tried to grab my camera when i aimed it at her:


interesting moment: from our seats, we had a clear view of the catwalk that leads to all the skyboxes. the box door over our heads just to our right bore the sign "the wirtz family" (if you don't know, the wirtzes own the hawks), and at one point, i looked up to see a bunch of people emerging from the box. i tapped the hockey genius next to me and said, "isn't that balding guy gary bettman?" as in nhl commissioner gary bettman. hockey genius said, "yeah, and that tall dude next to him is rocky." as in hawks' owner rocky wirtz, the guy who finally put hawks' home games on tv and has led the current blackhawks renaissance. we all began to loudly praise rocky, and he then showered us with a rain of hundred-dollar bills. actually, he just smiled and waved, but it was still a cool moment.


of course, even after a blistering first period, the hawks lost, which sucked. but the final outcome didn't diminish the truly amazing day, which ended with us riding the red line to the loop and catching a metra train back to the northwest suburbs. i took this quick pic as we were walking from the monroe street stop to union station, just for kicks. i love this city.